


Dropping Glasses Just To Hear Them Break

by geckoholic



Series: author's favorites [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alliances, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Breathplay, Comics Backstory, Deaf Clint Barton, Experimental Kink, F/M, Fear Play, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Knifeplay, No Safeword, Not Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Compliant, Sensory Deprivation, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-12
Updated: 2016-09-12
Packaged: 2018-08-14 16:53:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8021686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic
Summary: Clint's mission to kill the Black Widow ends up a disaster when he runs into a third party in the field and finds himself being turned from hunter to hunted. His former target offers her assistance, and soon he's in for a whole other brand of trouble.





	Dropping Glasses Just To Hear Them Break

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shenshen77](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shenshen77/gifts).



> As a, well, reward of sorts for being one of the people who put up with me daily on IM or email, I asked to be given a kink, and she picked sensory deprivation. I had every intention to just write some quick porn. That... is not quite what happened. It grew quite a bit of plot, and I'm considering to continue this as a verse. Maybe. We shall see. Also, the result is quite a bit darker than canon, which, well, you know, assassins. Dangerous people being drawn to each other is one of my favorite things and probably what keeps me rooted so firmly in this pairing. 
> 
> Beta-read by cloud-atlas, who also brainstormed with me and pushed me forward and nagged so this would get finished, plus she suggested the title, and by tastewithouttalent. Thank you both!! ♥ All remaining mistakes are mine.
> 
> Title is from "Glory And Gore" by Lorde.

Every once in a while, when traveling the world for assignments, Clint actually goes sightseeing. Not for the sheer fun of it, of course; he likes wandering through places older than the country he was born in, but not enough that he's going to risk a stink-eye from above. But in every place worth seeing, there'll be a loud, obnoxious group of fellow Americans, and they're a better cover than any persona he could come up on his own. He just has to fall in line, smile dumbly at his supposed fellow tourists, and melt into the crowd until it's time to sneak away. Tonight he's following a guided tour through Paris, headed by a young woman who's chattering on about history and architecture in broken, heavily accented English. Sunset was barely half an hour ago, but already he's feeling a little chilly, thanks to a sharp wind chasing leaves around the old buildings. 

According to their intel, she's going to be at the Palais Garnier tonight, visiting the opera with a mark. He's been scouting the nearby houses for a possible hiding spot earlier and found one on the balcony of a building with lax enough security. If all goes to plan, she'll never know what hit her. Literally. 

He thumbs through a flyer and glances around the brightly illuminated plaza near the opera, muscles going stiff with... not nerves exactly, but concentration. If he breaks from the group too soon, he'll draw glances, but the adrenaline has started coursing and he's anxious to get up high, unpack his gear – which he's disassembled and crammed into a backpack – and set up. He'll be fine as soon as he's on that balcony, hidden in the night, flat on his stomach with an arrow at the ready, waiting. 

Finally, they pass the right building. He frowns at his flyer, sighs with pretend frustration, and looks around. Lets the group gain on him a little, not so much that they'll notice and check back, but enough that there's no one close who could see him step out. Then it's autopilot, recalling his earlier route: fire escape to the third floor – there's an empty store with access to the staircase inside -- and from there up to the balcony. He puts his bow together with quick, practiced movements and then lowers himself into a crouch, quiver slung around his hip and resting against the small of his back, just within reach. 

She shows up around about twenty minutes later. There's too much distance between them to make out her face with the naked eye, but she'd described her dress to the mark and her red hair is a beacon all of its own. He takes his field glasses – not needed to aim, but he won't shoot to kill without reasonable confirmation of her identity – and waits for her to turn in his direction. Satisfied with the likeness, he lays the glasses aside and reaches for an arrow. 

That's when he hears the shot. At first he thinks he's got competition, that there's someone else with her in their sights, and the commotion in the plaza seems to point to that too. He curses – his life just got more complicated, they have no suspected location after tonight, he'll have to shadow her – but then a second shot rings through the night, much closer, and yep, okay, there's definitely someone on the balcony. He jumps to his feet and turns, already nocking, keeps an arrow pointed in sync with his line of sight. Another shot, and he it helps him pinpoint the direction of his attacker. Clint calculates the angle and distances in his head and comes to the conclusion that he's closer to the staircase than his attacker. He decides that he's not going to chase them around the balcony – close quarters would serve him up on a platter – and makes for the solid steel door to the stairs. 

A fourth shot swishes past him just when the door closes behind him, close enough that the sound makes his aids give off a static squeak. Body pressed to the cold metal, he paws through the contents of his backpack until he unearths one of the fancy gadgets SHIELD makes him carry whether he wants it or not. It's a small tube filled with chemicals kept in separate quarters and he presses the button atop it to get them to mix, then presses it into the lock. Seconds later, there's bubbling and sizzling, and the metal melts together, effectively locking the door to everyone who doesn't have a bolt cutter or one hell of a battering ram. He hears shouting from the balcony – more than one attacker, then – and runs down the stairs, through the shop, and takes the steps on the ladder outside the building two at a time, jumping down as soon as the height ceases to carry the risk of broken bones. 

The plaza is boiling with people running every which way in fear, and he hears police sirens not far off. Clint glances up to the nearby roofs. With a rough estimate based on how close the shot sounded to his balcony, he finds several possible locations of the other shooter. His eyes search and find Romanoff doing her best to fade into the panicked crowd. She's close enough that he _could_ try and finish the job from here, but she's moving too fast and surrounded by innocent bystanders; it's impossible. He's good, and he's cocky about it, but he knows his limits. Clint ducks away into a nearby alley. He'll contact his handler from his motel room, report and regroup. Tonight is a lost cause. 

 

***

 

“What the fuck kinda hornet's nest did you send me into this time?” Clint opens, because fuck diplomacy. If he's got bullets hailing around his head because of shit intel, the suit monkeys are damn well going to hear about it. 

“Agent Barton, uh, sir. What do you mean?” The young guy manning the top-secret SHIELD version of FaceTime tonight – or this morning, probably, over in the US – ducks from the screen. If Clint's not mistaken, he's even pushing his desk chair back a little. 

Clint rolls his eyes. “Go find someone who knows what they're doing. I'll hold.” 

He didn't expect protest and there isn't any. The screen goes black, and Clint returns his attention to the surveillance photos from various restaurants and fancy boutiques they’ve dug up while tracking the Black Widow the past few days. She’s only recognizable because of the hair and because he’s invested a fair amount of time learning the shape of her, the way she moves; anticipating her reactions in case there’d be a fight. Not like he’d expect her to be an easy opponent if it ever came to that, or that he’d actually succeed in predicting her, but he would’ve been remiss not to try.

Five minutes later the screen flares back to live and a very aggravated Hill sits down in the aforementioned office chair. Her disapproving glare is very, very disapproving. He doesn’t buy it for a second.

“Stop scaring the rookies,” she says with a perfectly straight face, and anyone who _hasn't_ been working with her for the better part of a decade might take this as a reprimand. Clint just grins at her. 

“Someone's gotta throw them into the deep end, Hill, how else will they learn?” he says, and winks at her too, for effect, but then sobers his expression. “I got shot at by a third party tonight. I'd say I'm unimpressed, but that's an understatement.” 

She raises her finger to swipe back and forth on her screen, eyes scanning the screen while she reads outside their chat window, frowns when she's done. “We didn't know they were in Paris, or could be after you. I apologize.” He rolls his eyes, and she stares him down. “I mean it. Trust me, if I had plans to get rid of you, I'd do it myself. We've known each other too long for anything else.” 

People outside of the intelligence community would probably assume their lot doesn’t have much of a moral compass, or anything that passes for honor. They’d be wrong, about the latter at least. Honor among spies is a thing and not to be discarded. That’s why he wouldn’t just walk up to Romanoff and shoot her point blank, even though he _could_ – a bit too loud and too obvious, but an option in a pinch. And sure, for one, Clint doesn't _like_ guns. He considers them cheating, inelegant, mundane. But also, a single bullet through the skull, that's for your everyday drug lord or weapons dealer. She's another spy. He may not have vetoed the kill order – there's ample reason to take her out – but they share a profession. No shortcuts with her; she deserves his respect and she deserves him at his best.

“Charming,” Clint tells Hill, digging himself out of his thoughts, and shoots her an exaggerated sleazy smile, which she ignores, because she's the bigger person. Always has been. It's why she's in the command center giving orders and he's up on roofs evading enemy fire. 

Another motion on her screen and his own notepad pings. He minimizes the FaceTime window and pulls up the file, scowling at the contents. Looks like he left an impression four jobs ago and they actually managed to sniff him out again. Drug ring. They were dilettantes, in the grand scheme of things, but apparently they're pissed enough to make up for lack of skill with heightened determination. Awesome. 

“You wanna come home?” Hill asks. “Get this sorted first?” 

Clint considers his options. Door one means being safely flown back headquarters for a nice little vacation in a guarded room, while the Black Widow mission gets delayed by another couple of months until they catch sight of her again. Door two means continuing to chase his target while someone else is chasing _him_. He thumbs the surveillance photos again, then the old printouts from the file. Sao Paulo. Odessa. She needs to be stopped, and she needs to be stopped _soon_.

He shrugs. “Nah. I can take them.” 

Hill merely nods and makes a quick note on her screen. “I'll put your monitoring team on high alert. Anything happens, you let us know immediately.” 

“Sure thing,” Clint says, putting a finger to his temple in a mocking salute, and ends the call. 

 

***

 

Dark alleys are among the most common places for spy business to be conducted, but Clint hates them. He likes to be aware of his surroundings, able to keep an eye on everything that goes on around him, which is kinda hard when it's so pitch-dark he could hardly see his own hand were he to hold it up in front of his face. But the kind of spy Romanoff is specializes in acting under the cover of darkness, and he's been following her through a fair few of those alleys the last few days. Waiting for his moment; waiting for a place that's far enough from the busy tourist traps to avoid bystanders. So far, he's been waiting in vain.

He follows her to a park near her hotel, where she saunters around the flamboyant flower arrangements and imported trees like she's nothing special, hands in her coat, seemingly aimless. It's almost like she's taunting him – the lighting here is better, spotlights by the footpath and overhead to illuminate the plants, few people but enough of them that they're protecting her by simply being there.

On second thought, that might be exactly what this is: a taunt, a tease, telling him she know he's there, and knows just how to keep him from completing his mission. Because she's not stupid; even if she hadn't noticed him before, the incident in the theater made for a big fucking neon sign that there's _someone_ on her trail. So she got even more careful, kept her head down, but also avoided actually unpopulated areas. The only way she could have been less subtle is if she'd turned around to wink at him. He's kinda expecting that to happen any day now, actually.

It keeps them in a bit of a stalemate, but comes with the neat side effect that the people after him don’t get another opening for an attack either.

She stops on near a rose bush and cocks her head at it, contemplative. Then she turns, glancing in his general direction, and Clint _knows_ she’s seen him. That in itself isn’t new, she must have noticed him a few times, but it sends a cold shiver down his spine anyway. Might be this is the point at which she decides she’s had enough and it’s time to turn the tables on him. He doesn’t doubt that she’d be able to take him out quietly and discreetly, should she so choose.

Slowly, every step seeming deliberate and weighted, she walks over to a nearby bench and sits down. She turns her head to him again and winks.

“Sit with me,” she says. “We should talk.”

Clint reviews his options. He could ignore her, pretend he didn’t notice that _she_ noticed _him_ and keep on tailing her. He could run and call for extraction, considering she’s made him and that he’s still got a tail of his own and that’s more than enough reason to consider this mission compromised, but… yeah, no. Or he could see where this goes, what her intentions are. Why she wants to _talk_.

In the end, he steps out of the shadows and sits down next to her due to plain old curiosity. “What’s there to chat about, really?”

She shrugs, nonchalantly, like it all doesn’t really matter to her. “I know Jervat’s gang is after you.”

“So?” he asks, well aware that she skipped on the other the matter, here, namely that he’s after _her_. It’s strategy, maybe, on her part. Making him feel insignificant, so doomed to fail that he’s not even worth mentioning. Not a bad strategy, but the wrong approach with him. Clint has a lot of issues. Doubting his skill and efficiency when it comes to his work is not among them.

“I can help you,” Romanoff offers, with a smile that could turn saints into sinners.

“I'm sure you could,” Clint replies, holding her gaze and smirking back. “But pardon me if I question your motives.”

“Aww.” She shakes her head, pouts a little. “You hurt me.” Clint rolls his eyes, snorting in disbelief, and her expression loses the playful façade. Even her voice is different, more businesslike, when she speaks again. “I have a client with a vested interest in making their lives harder. We take this group out together, send back their heads with a warning letter to the boss, and then we can happily go back to trying to kill one another.”

He leans back and extends his arms to grip the edge of the bench. That this makes his arm brush her back, forcing her to either accept the contact or shift to avoid it, is deliberate. “See, this isn't my call to make. Even if I’d trusted you to not stab me in the back – literally – the second I let my guard down, that is. I have superiors. A handler. Any deals have to be cleared with them, and, yeah, not really expecting that one to get a nod from up above.”

Romanoff frowns, but does not move away. “I didn’t peg you for the kind of agent who requests approval on every single step they take in the field.”

“No,” says Clint. “I’m not. But teaming up with the target I was sent to kill? That may exceed my authority to decide on the fly.”

She surveys him with a closed-off, unreadable expression for a moment longer, before rising to her feet. “Well then. Suit yourself.”

As she walks away, Clint considers just getting it over with. Shoot her right now, right here. But there’s a pair of lovebirds walking arm in arm a couple feet away from them and an elderly lady stands in earshot, explaining the flowers they pass to the child she’s with. Too much of an audience, still, shielding her and making his job harder.

 

***

 

Their stalemate extends, a long game of cat and mouse that is about to exceed boring, for Clint, and delve into something darker. His hideout seems to become smaller every day that he returns to it without having accomplished anything. The daily sit rep requests from headquarters go ignored in favor of a simple text to Hill that says _I’ll notify you once she’s dead. Until then, just assume that I’m not_. Clint’s not impatient; if the success of a mission requires him to sit idle and wait for any stretch of time, he’ll do that. The lack of success, and the decreasing likelihood it will be achieved, is what gets to him. It has him sitting on his bed in the half-dark, throwing knives at flies on the wall, left leg jiggling involuntarily every time he lessens his focus.

Clint doesn’t like losing. Clint isn’t _used_ to losing. Not anymore.

There was a version of him that lost every fight it picked, frequently and with grave consequences; the aids in his ears still bear witness to those. But that Clint died alongside his parents, and Romanoff won’t see it resurrected.

He’s thrown the last of his knives and stands to retrieve them all, giving the blinking red letters on his bedside alarm clock a glance. Nearly 3 AM, and the lights outside produce their own solar circle effect, like in every other city of this size. It never gets dark. Too many people buzzing around, too many restaurants and shops and billboards vying for their attention with bright displays that join together and illuminate the streets at every hour of the day.

Sighing at the blue and yellow light that comes from the neon signs of across the street, advertising a 24-hour-gas-station, Clint pulls the knives from the wall and moves to sit back down, start over. He’s lining up the first throw when he sees a shadow flit by his window. Rookie work, really. Someone with proper training would have known how to avoid being seen. Duck away when crossing the window, or better yet, approach from the other side – it’s not rocket science.

His hand closes tighter around the hilt of the knife and he scoots back on the bed, giving himself a better angle. The lock on the door cracks, the tinny metallic sound of a lock pick reverberating in the otherwise silent room, only interrupted by a car driving past outside. They’re not too skilled at that either, taking so long that Clint contemplates going ahead and _opening_ the damn door, blade to the throat of whoever’s closest before they even know what hit them. But that’s impatience speaking, not strategy, because if there’s more than one or two of them he’s fucked in close quarters, and so he doesn’t move a muscle. Seconds trickle by like years, and he waits.

Then the door finally, _finally_ drops open and Clint aims on autopilot, hears the oomph of a body hitting the ground before he’s even consciously away of throwing the knife. There’s three of them, and the remaining two spring to the side, out of the way of their dead companion’s fall. One retreats behind the wall. The other raises a gun at Clint and shouts something in a language he doesn’t care to understand. 

On the spot, his body floods with adrenaline, and it spreads throughout his nervous system like the first drops of rain after a long, dreadful summer. He picks up another knife for the next throw and spins it in his hands, grinning.

He never finds out whether the guy would have fired, whether his orders were to capture or kill.

Even without their dance the past few weeks, Clint would have been able to identify the newly arrived cloaked figure number four as Romanoff. She makes quick work of the two remaining attackers, dispatches them with efficient, fast moves that look almost effortless; like she’s dancing, like it’s fun.

Clint is off the bed and on his feet in one move, knife now turned up and pressed to his upper leg, watching her sneer at the bodies on the floor.

"Amateurs," Romanoff spits, followed by a few mumbled words in Russian.  
　  
He's not gaping at her, or anything of the sort, but that's only because he's a trained professional and suppressing visible reactions is part of the skill set. "What the _fuck_ are you doing here?" 

"I told you." She rolls her eyes, clearly not enthused by having to explain herself more than once. "There's someone who'll pay a handsome fee each time one of these drops dead." She idly kicks at the nearest dead goon and shrugs. "In today's economy, can anyone afford to pass up a little extra money on the side?"  
　  
Nothing about her body language tells him she's lying, but she's got the same training he did. Better training, probably, in that regard, and more of it too. The math here isn't that complicated: he's in the city to kill her and she doesn't seem like she's harboring a death wish. The most likely conclusion, therefore, is that she won't let _him_ walk out of here alive.  
　  
He smiles, intentionally relaxes his posture, and steps forward. Romanoff doesn't take her eyes off him, but she lets him approach, gun still in her hand but finger off the trigger. He reaches out his hand, like for a handshake, and at the last moment shifts so he can wrap his arm around her neck and bend her backwards, twist her wrist with his other arm so she'll let go of the gun.  
　  
The ensuing fight is quick and vicious. She twists out of his grasp and lunges at him, landing a kick to his torso that momentarily knocks the wind out of him and causes his grip on the knife to loosen just enough that a second well-aimed kick to the back of his hand makes him drop it completely. He retaliates with a flat hand to her kidney, sideways, which hurts enough that the pain flashes across her face. She steels herself quickly and sinks to the floor, sliding between his legs and landing a rather effective punch to his privates. And if she wants to play it dirty, he can do that; he bends down, using the anguished reaction she surely expected as a cover for his next move; still grimacing and huffing, making a production out of it, he swings upward and lands a left hook to her jaw.  
　  
She looks at him with disdain, and he can't figure out whether it's because he's graduated to messing with her face or because she doesn't appreciate the inelegant bar brawl tactics. But it's accompanied with a smile, even as she launches herself at him again and _jumps_.  
　  
He doesn't often get to fight a worthy opponent; he assumes the same applies to her. Worthy of him, or, in this instance, maybe superior; Clint evades, but it's at the cost of his balance, and the smug expression she wears when he looks up has him convinced she might have counted on that very same result.  
　  
What she seemingly overlooked is that he'd land in arm's length of where his knife fell to the floor. Clint twists and grabs it, aiming for her legs rather than bothering to stand before he strikes, but he's proven wrong; she anticipates the attack and pivots out of reach, follows that up with a kick to the side of his face that makes his vision blur. While he's still dazed, she steps on his hand, causing him to grunt in pain and let go of the knife.  
　  
"For the moment, you're more useful to me if you're alive and cooperating." She bends to retrieve the knife, which increases the pressure on his hand, and Clint can't keep in a wince. "But if you insist on being difficult, I don't have a problem with jamming that damn knife through your throat and walking away either.” 

On the last word, she steps away. While he sits up, he holds his hand up and turns it this way and that, stretches out each bone, inspecting them for damage. “Okay. First piece of advice for teaming up with an archer: don't ruin his fingers.” 

“I'm assuming that means you're making the correct choice,” Romanoff says. She scowls as she walks up to the window and draws back the curtain to peer outside. “First of all, we need to leave. I have a car. They'll send backup as soon as they realize their first team stopped responding, and we can't properly defend ourselves here.” 

The ever-present bratty teenager in Clint might object to the assumption that she's in charge here but, for one thing, she's the one who's still holding the knife, and for another, well. The reasonable professional in him is inclined to agree with her. They _do_ need get moving. 

 

***

 

“So where're we going?” Clint asks. He's got his feet up on the dashboard and, with a groan, shifts so he can widen his legs further. That earns him a seething glare from the driver's seat, but if she thought it wise to punch him in the dick as a prelude to blackmailing him into a team-up, then _she_ can deal with his knees sticking into her driving space while he avoids all pressure in that general area. And that's not the only area of concern; he's got a ringing headache from her final kick and one of his hearing aids has been complaining at him in the form of intermediate little bleeps for, he figures, much the same reason. 

“Safehouse outside of the city,” she replies, her gaze back on the road ahead. “I have supplies there. Weapons. We’ll make a plan and take them out.”

Clint is rather sure she already has a plan; doesn’t seem like the type who enlists him first and _then_ figures out the next step. But she’ll also have a reason for stalling, and since they’re on the same side for now, he’ll let that slide. He nods to the weapons case in the backseat. “I’ve got my weapon right here. Don’t need another.”

She doesn’t follow the gesture or look his way. “Curious choice, that. Why did you pick it?”

“Long story,” he says and tips his head back against on the head rest of the seat. Her file is still marked with an active kill order, and his body is aching in several places from their fight less than an hour ago. The last thing he feels like is giving her his autobiography. He turns and squints outside, but it’s still dark and they’ve left the downtown area, which means the only light around is the beam of the car’s headlights.

She could be lying, could be taking them anywhere, but Clint supposes that doesn’t make a difference for the moment. He closes his eyes and listens to the hum of the moving car, biting the inside of his cheek every so often to keep from falling asleep. Wait and see. It’s all he can do right now anyway.

 

***

 

In all honesty, he’s a little surprised when she veers onto an unpaved country road around sunrise, the silhouette of a farm house already visible in the distance against an impressively colored sky bathed in yellow and pink and blue.

Clint sits up and rubs his temples. “Idyllic.”

“Serves its purpose,” Romanoff says with a shrug. She decelerates and eventually brings them to a stop in front of a barn that looks older than his entire home town back in Iowa and points at the large double gate. “Make yourself useful, would you?”

He does as he’s told, gets out and opens the gate, and trots after her as she closes the doors and leads him towards the house. They’re greeted by a small cloud of dust when she opens the door. All the furniture inside is covered in tarps and blankets, and he relaxes a bit; no one has been here in quite a while. Doesn’t mean she won’t feed him to the wolves eventually, but at least it doesn’t look like they’re already waiting for them.

She points at a table in what he figures is the living room and he drops his gear onto it while she removes the tarp from a dingy, outdated couch, sits down, and pats the upholstery to suggest he do the same. Then she points at a small meters and fuse box on the wall behind them, the kind that contains power and phone cords. All of them are cut, sticking out of the plastic box with frayed edges.

“I lied to you,” she says, calm, matter-of-factly, and Clint feels reminded of an executioner reading out a verdict. The thought isn’t as upsetting as it probably should be. “There is no bounty on Jervat’s gang. I’m not helping you to line my pockets.”

“Well,” he says, leaning back. “I kinda figured.”

She nods, demeanor still impenetrable, impossible to read. Which is why what she says next catches him completely off-guard. “I offered to help you because, when this is done, I want you to bring me in.”

“Bring you – “ Clint says, because he’s pretty sure he must have misunderstood. “Excuse me, what?”

Romanoff sighs, and it sounds weary, tired. “I want protection. Employment. I have my reasons.”

Proper procedure would be to call this in. Report to Hill, who’ll report to Fury, and let them take the decision off his hands. But they’re in the middle of nowhere, miles away from any sort of backup or even an internet connection or reception to call for said backup. Or to check in with Hill, for that matter. Which might be a good thing, on second thought, because chances are he’d be dead the second they tell her _no_. 

This is his decision, here and now, and she set it up this way on purpose.

She lets him work through all of that on his own, and only speaks again when he looks up, head cocked, waiting for her next move. “We take care of Jervat’s gang. I prove that I stand by my word, once I’ve given it, and you make a case for me with your employers. That’s all I ask.”

“And if they decline?” Clint asks, because while that would solve another one of his problems, it’d merely postpone this one.

She gives another shrug. “We drive back to Paris, give each other a day’s head start. Then we can go back to playing our deadly game of tag.” 

There's nothing that'd keep him from taking her help and then offing her where they stand, just as there's nothing that keeps her from shooting him on the spot this very second. Honor amongst spies; it's a fragile thread to bind your life to, but Clint figures it's all both of them have right now. 

He nods. “Fine. You got it.” 

 

***

 

Mere hours after they arrived, the uncomfortable familiarity of this place begins to circulate underneath his skin. Coincidence, no doubt, because the Black Widow is good but no one is _that_ good, to know how a lonely old farm house in the country would affect him. The facts are all there, he supposes, not only in SHIELD's files but on public record: the extensive medical file, the accident, the psychological reports from the orphanages after. Make the right connections, connect the right dots, and there you are, uncovering the scared child he once was. 

Either way, he's convinced she knows _something_ is askew. She sends him side glances like he's a rare new animal sitting in a glass case, taken home from a faraway part of the world and due to be investigated, poked and prodded so it can be categorized and demystified, registered and made ordinary. 

Clint shakes his head, because that's bullshit, and she doesn't know _anything_. She's on the other end of the room, sat at a large dining table to catalog her guns and ammo, and he clears his throat to get her attention. 

Romanoff turns, fingers stilling on a pistol with a pearlescent handle that some people might call elegant, and quirks an eyebrow. 

“So how're we gonna do this?” he asks, for one because it's not like they have anything else to talk about, and then, well, she'll have to share her plan with him at some point. 

With a sigh, annoyed, as unused to teamwork as he is, she sets the pistol down completely and spins around on her chair. “I have contacts in the city, and I set up a trap. Someone approached them with a delivery for tomorrow night, convenient side business to be conducted while they wait for their next shot at taking you out. It’s bogus, of course. We’ll be waiting for them instead. Make it clear once and for all that you’re more than they can handle.”

Straightforward enough, in theory, although it lacks details. He figures she'll impart those on him as they go, and hey, he can work with that. “Tomorrow, huh? And until then?” 

“We stay here, prepare, enjoy the scenery.” She smiles, sweetly. “You did point out how idyllic a place this is.”

Without waiting for a comeback, she turns back to her guns, and really, that he's sitting here, watching the Black Window handle lethal weapons, should concern him a lot more. Maybe he's just tired, worn down; he's had a grand total of three hours of rest in the last twenty-four hours, and it might be time to weigh up the risk of sleeping in the same house as her against the risk of working with her while severely sleep-deprived. 

“Fine,” he says. “Then I'm gonna go take a nap.” 

“There're beds upstairs,” she informs him with a quick glance over her shoulder, and yeah, no shit. There always are, in houses like this, be they in France or in Iowa or where the hell ever. Some things are universal. 

But Clint doesn't bother pointing that out. He simply stands, grabs his bag and gear, and heads for the stairs. 

 

***

 

He quietly blinks awake, without startling or moving much at all, the way his training requires, and he doesn’t quite relax when her presence in the room registers. But he does open his eyes – no tactical advantage in feigning sleep – and sees her standing in the doorway with her hands clasped in front of her body. He can’t have been asleep for long, because it’s still bright daylight, which the thick drawn curtains in the room he picked only manage to dim so much.

“Very good,” Romanoff says, and it does sound genuinely appreciative. “I didn’t even have to clear my throat or make any noise.”

His eyelids feel like they weigh roughly a ton, and the belt buckle of his tac suit has gotten knotted up and bites into the skin of his stomach, but he resists righting it or showing discomfort. He blinks, and yawns, and folds his arms behind his head so he doesn’t have to crane it in order to keep her in his line of sight.

“What do you want?” he asks, none too kindly.

“We probably gave each other a concussion. It would be irresponsible not to check in on you.” She pouts a little, like he’s insulting her good intentions. “And I have nothing to gain from letting you die in your sleep.”

“Great,” he says, yawning again, this time for show. “I’m alive. Also, I’m awake and I’d prefer not to be, so could you get lost and let me sleep a bit more?”

Of course, she doesn’t do him the favor. She pushes herself off the door frame and saunters further into the room, looking at him with a cheerful quirk to her lips. She sits down on the edge of the bed, prodding at a stain in the carpet with the tip of her shoes while looking at him from under her lashes, all seductive innocence, and Clint swallows, sitting up.

Her file wasn’t subtle about the means by which Romanoff obtains male cooperation. During his preparation for this mission, that wasn’t a concern; he was supposed to kill her from a distance, quick and clean and simple. And besides, he likes to think he’s not so easy to manipulate, that he’d smell a seduction attempt from a mile off, and that he’d react accordingly.

“Fuck you,” Clint tells her, preemptively.

Romanoff clicks her tongue, her smile widening, and places her hand on his thigh. “Now, that’s rude.”

And see, the thing is, it’s not like he doesn’t find her _attractive_. She’s pretty. He’s ready to admit that much, and he’s generally in favor of quick, uncomplicated fucks with people he’ll never see again. But that’s just it; they’ll either become colleagues or she’ll revert back to being a target. Neither will be made _less_ complicated if he hooks up with her now. Clint shifts and folds his legs underneath himself, now sitting cross-legged. 

Not deterred, Romanoff scoots up the bed so she can replace her hand, now even higher up on the inside of this leg. Clint sets upon mentally reciting the first page of the SHIELD’s agent handbook, the most boring thing he had to read in recent history, and wills his body into staying firmly unimpressed.

“Stop,” he says, keeping his voice level. “Get out.”

She outright _smirks_ , and does not stop. “What is it? Still sore? Not man enough? Not interested?”

Her voice gains an amused tinge at the last question, implying she rarely ever runs into a man who plainly _isn't interested_. She runs a fingertip down his jaw and leans in close, slowly, eyes fixed on his lips, until there’s a mere inch of space left between their faces. The only way she could be clearer about her intentions would be sending out an engraved invitation, and the blatancy actually makes it easier to resist.

Clint jerks his head away. “I repeat: _fuck you_.“

She pulls back and cocks her head, surveying him, the smile and flirtatious attitude wiped away in an instant. They stare at one another. She shoves her hand further up his leg, holding his gaze. He jiggles it to shake her off.

“Fine.” In one fluid motion, she rises to her feet. “I meant what I said about checking in on you, though. I’ll be in every hour to wake you, and in the meantime, I’ll be waiting downstairs.”

With that, she saunters out of the room. Once the door has fallen shut behind her, Clint takes in a breath and pushes it back out in whoosh, rights himself through his pants, and decides that sleep is overrated anyway. He'll find out whether this place has running water, take a shower. 

 

***

 

After thirty seconds of brackish brown sludge, the pipes actually spit out clear, hot water, and Clint strips, collects his clothes in the sink – they all carry blood or sweat, he'll burn them later – and steps under the spray. The effect the water's having on his aching muscles is nothing short of blissful, and he stays in the small shower stall until it goes lukewarm. Spies travel light, so his bag doesn't contain towels, and he stands naked in front of the fogged up mirror, takes a lighter to his old clothes and watches them burn down while the air dries his skin. Once they’re reduced to a charred mess, he douses the remains. 

Wearing fresh tac pants and base layer, hair still wet, he returns downstairs. He drops his stuff back on the table in the living room area and, without sparing Romanoff a glance, unpacks his quiver. He takes stock of its contents twice a day, but hey, that thing is his life insurance. No one could fault him for making sure he won't run out of ammo unexpectedly in the field. 

“Changed your mind about nap time?” Romanoff asks. Clint doesn't turn, but he hears her heels click on the old hardwood floor. She peers over his shoulder, hovering too close, just this side of breaching his personal space, but thankfully doesn't follow when he takes a step to the side. 

He points towards the arrows on the table. “I could use some more of an idea of what you're planning. Just so I know how to space these out.” 

“You won't be needing any of those,” she says, all the while watching him with a theatrical little pout at the repeated rejection. “It's simple. The meet is an abandoned warehouse in the industrial district. The deal was for a shipment of party drugs. Instead, you'll be waiting for them.” 

“Just me?” Her reluctance to give him details on the plan is starting to make sense. “So I'm bait?”

The pout vanishes from her face, making room for strict professionalism. It's a little scary, how quickly she sheds personas. From sulky seductress to focused in the blink of an eye. Then again, those exact skills are _her_ life insurance. 

“You'll be there to catch their eye,” she says. “Throw them for a loop. They're expecting you. And while they're distracted, trying to adjust to the new situation, picking them off will be easy.” 

Clint shoots her a doubtful look. “They won't be the only ones standing around for easy picking.” 

“We can't know for sure how many men they'll bring. Showing our whole hand from the start would be stupid.” There's no way to read her expression, not like this; she doesn't even show annoyance at his accusation or having to explain herself further. That, too, is part of her skill set. “They know you're involved, but they don't know about me. It's the best play.” 

He puts all the contempt he can muster into another glare, but doesn't argue further. Discussions with her aren't likely to get him anywhere, and he's been half-expecting a literal knife to the back all day. She hasn't killed him so far, hasn't even tried. Maybe he should count that in her favor. Much as it pains him, this whole spiel isn't going to work without some measure of trust. 

Clint huffs, but doesn't argue further. He collects his gear, crams the arrows back into the quiver and shoves it across the table with a loud clank. The faulty hearing aid bleeps at him unhappily and he reaches up to take it out and throw it after the quiver. He learned his trade without high-end hearing aids of nebulous origin sponsored by a shady government agency. He can still do his job one down. 

 

*** 

 

The rain's battering relentlessly onto the roof of the warehouse; even the short walk from the car has left his clothes damp and clinging to his body in places, more uncomfortable now that he's stopped moving and they're cooling down in the chilly night air. His headache has returned, or maybe it never left, a constant dull ache pulsing through his skull with every beat of his heart. Could be it's just harder to ignore now, waiting for the arrival of Jervat's dogs like a piece of meat on a platter. 

They're late. It’s a cheap and transparent tactic, meant to set his teeth on edge and make him anxious, and another hint at what amateurs his opponents really are. No – _their_ opponents, Clint reminds himself. Romanoff is sitting in the rafters above, sniper rifle from his own stash at the ready. He breathes deep and his headache spikes. There's something that has him anxious here alright, and it's not Jervat's little gang of half-baked wannabe mobsters. Those are just pissing him off further with every additional minute he has to stand around uselessly in the cold. He wants to trade places with her, wants to be able to gauge the situation from above. 

He startles at the noise of another vehicle outside. Blinks, because he's coming up on his second day without more than like an hour of sleep, and listens as doors are opened and banged shut, men chattering in a language he could decipher if he'd invested a little effort and concentration, but he doesn't feel like doing that. This isn't a surgical mission. He doesn't need to extract any secrets. The ideal end is with them dead and him alive. 

Clint squares his shoulders and adjusts his stance, arms crossed behind his back in his own little nugget of field psychology. 

“Hello, fellas.” He grins big, his whole body language a textbook example for total lack of concern. “Nice of you to show.”

Whispered confusion spreads amongst his welcoming committee – well technically _he's_ the welcome committee and they're the guests, not the other way around, but who's keeping track – and one or two shout something Clint translates into warnings that this might be a trap. Quick thinkers, right there. The epiphany spreads and guns are drawn, and he's expecting the first bodies to drop right about now. 

They don't. Clint itches with an urge to turn around and check Romanoff's position, but that would be unprofessional and dumb, so he doesn't. He doesn't have his bow, too obvious. He does have a gun hidden at his back and another at his ankle, but the math here isn't in his favor, and she _must_ have a plan. Maybe she's seeing something, from up high, that he doesn't, and that's precisely why he hates being on the ground and in the fray. He can't see the big picture. He has to trust in his backup to get him covered, and that's not an easy exercise when said backup _isn't_ an enemy assassin right on top of his own kill list. He squints past the group lined up in front of him, and to his disappointment finds that some of them remained by the car. Outside. In reach of the door. 

Well. That is unfortunate, and way more strategic than he'd hoped. He infuses some more cocksure-and-unconcerned into his grin and takes a step forward, pointing at a crate a few feet away from him, in the dark where the overhead lights don't quite reach. It's empty. They're not supposed to get as far as finding out about that. “Oh hey, is that any way to react to a peace offering?” 

One of the thugs steps forward and glares sideways at the crate, like it's somehow in league with Clint. Then he looks at Clint himself. “What's that?” 

“Exactly what you came here to collect,” Clint says, stepping forward, arms moving to know cross them over his chest. Further away from his gun, which he doesn’t like, but he's hoping it makes him seem less like he's got something to hide. He eyes the men outside in the rain. They're slowly getting soaked, they somehow seem bored, and they're not making any move to come inside. 

“Then show us,” says the thug in charge and nods at the crate. 

Clint saunters over, making a show of it, and hopes that the few additional seconds that gains him will grant him an epiphany. As soon as he opens the fucking crate, they're blown. With every step, the gun at his back shifts with the movements of his body, and he's balling his hands into fists to keep from grabbing it and hoping for the best. He's nearly there when something clatters to the ground behind him. He turns. 

It's the sniper riffle. Romanoff follows suit, descending from the rafters on a rope with the fluidity of a dancer in the midst of a stage performance. She pulls a small gun from her own back – he recognizes it, the one he's watched her clean the other day, and for some reason he finds that hilarious – and she catches and keeps his gaze while she saunters over to the crate. 

And then, in a single motion without hesitation or consideration, she breaks eye contact and puts the muzzle of said gun to his temple. 

“The crate is empty,” she announces, addressing the cluster of henchmen. “I hope you will forgive me for the charade, but it did serve its purpose.” 

Clint curses, the more colorful insults all hurled her way. He lowers his head, which shifts the position of the gun pointed at him, and she follows his movements, keeps it pressed to his skin. Otherwise, she pays him no mind. 

“I hope this will serve as a basis for fruitful business collaboration in the future,” she says, smiling brightly, and Clint's just about had enough of this bullshit. _Screw her._. He won't go down quietly. 

He takes a quick, wide step toward her, one of his arms weaving around her arm holding the gun, and by the time she gets around to pulling the trigger he's yanked it far enough off center that the shot goes into empty air. Another step and he's lodging his foot between both of hers and yanking at her arm again, and it could have worked on a less agile opponent, but with her, it's a doomed move; she twists out of his grip and swings around, her body curling around his chest like a vice, and then she spins, knocking the wind out of him and his legs out from under his body at the same time. 

When they're done, Clint finds himself prone on the ground, cheek pressed into the dirt, and the gun back at his temple. She lessens the pressure and he chances a glance around and looks up into the barrels of roughly half a dozen more weapons. He knows when he's lost. He lifts his arms as much as he's able in surrender, hands outstretched, and doesn't resist as she pulls him up and clicks cuffs in place around his wrists. 

“Let's get him to the car,” one of the henchmen suggests, and though now assent is given, his buddies move towards the door, letting Romanoff and him pass before them. It's ridiculous that having them all at his rear makes his skin prickle with fear, when his imminent death has just become a matter of _when_ , not _if_. Whether they shoot him in the back right now or wait until they've transported him fuck-knows-where makes no difference. Actually, a quick bullet to the brain is probably the best he can hope for, and a rather unlikely finale. 

He hears the door of the warehouse roll shut behind them. The rain has picked up and it quickly runs down his temples in rivulets, a ball of nervous, aimless trepidation forming in the pit of his stomach as he realizes that he can't even wipe that away. He licks it off his lips at least and follows Romanoff to the car – 

And Romanoff jumps, her fingers a tight vice around his wrist, dragging him along. He loses his balance and stumbles, but manages not to fall, and next thing he knows he's crouched behind a refuse container with her and she's fumbling at the lock of his cuffs. 

Clint can't help it, he stares, all the while blinking rain out of his eyes. “What the –?” 

“I had to improvise. We needed to get them out of the warehouse, or we would have gotten trapped.” She elbows him sharply into the rips once she's got his hands free. “Gun. From your waistband. You might want to use that.” 

And yes, she's not wrong, he very much wants to use that. He decides to postpone any attempts at wrapping his head around what just happened. He takes the gun out, and he nods when she signals for each of them to poke their heads around one end of the container, and he shoots everything that has the misfortune of appearing in his line of sight. 

 

*** 

 

He's stupidly grateful when he realizes that she's not driving them out of the city. Not back to the old farm house, and maybe, after a good night's sleep, the demons that found him there will have climbed off his back. Clint knows he should have asked her about their destination when they left the warehouse, it was negligent not to, but he's tired and confused. He continues to be alive and he's still, again, a little surprised by that. 

Romanoff steers them through sparsely lit back alleys in a corner of the city travel guides never mention except to warn people off, and she stops at an old house snuggled up between two larger, even older houses, all of them decorated with colorful, carved beams to break up the brick work. He thinks of old fairytales he read in the orphanage, the drawings that accompanied them, meant to be beautiful, cute even, but terrifying beyond words when you're a child reading them in the half-dark and you're alone and you never had anyone to keep you save from harm in the first place. 

Clint breathes in deep, the air a charming combination of food smells and exhaust fumes and the stink of overflowing garbage. He pinches the bridge of his nose and screws his eyes shut for a second. 

She doesn't wait for him, doesn't look back, just quietly unlocks the door and leaves it open so he can follow. The contrary, petulant parts of him want to turn and run and see what happens, but he's done playing catch. She'll find him again, or he'll find her; it doesn't really matter. So he takes his bag and gear from the car and follows her inside the house. The furniture here isn't covered. They're much too old and much too cheap that it'd make a difference – seventies probably, cheap and mismatched, illuminated by a naked light bulb swinging from the ceiling. The kind of one-room apartment that you can rent for a small price and keep off the books, and the landlord won't ask questions as long as the money appears on the regular. Clint has a few boltholes like this himself. SHIELD knows about some of them. 

He drops his bag on the ground and places his bow and quiver carefully on top, and saunters into the kitchenette. He opens the fridge; it's working but empty. He opens a few cupboards, and there's canned food and ramen noodles and some instant coffee. That, he fishes out, and he looks around and finds a water kettle, shrugs, and sets about preparing himself something at least vaguely in the neighborhood of caffeine. 

Halfway through pouring powder into a mug, he turns and cocks an eyebrow at Romanoff. “Want some?” 

Up until now she might have as well not been in the room, quietly watching him, but now she strides his way with dark eyes and an impatient, exasperated expression. She roughly pulls the box with the coffee from his hands and sends it flying across the countertop, its contents spilling out on the dirty, chipped plastic. 

Clint frowns at her. “What'd you do that for?” 

“You nearly got yourself killed,” she accuses, fingers of the hand that ruined his chances of a caffeine infusion in the near future now gripping the edge of the counter, holding on so hard her fingers are going white. He doesn't mistake her reaction for worry. “And you can't die yet. You're my ticket out of...”

“Yeah,” Clint says when it becomes apparent she has no intention to finish that sentence. He leans against the counter with his arms crossed in front of his chest. “Out of _what_ exactly?”

“No concern of yours,” she says, spitting the words, and her gaze zeroes in on where the muscles in his arms bunch up against each other and stretch out the short sleeves of his base layer. 

The mood between them changes almost too fast for him to keep track of, as if someone flipped a switch and turned up the temperature and suddenly he feels like he's on the verge of sweating, like it's a little harder to breathe. Her eyes rake up and down his body in a way that seems vaguely calculating, examining, until they land on his face, and there's that look again, like she's trying to figure him out and he's deliberately being difficult. Which is not the case. Clint's a simple guy, not too many moving parts, and he wouldn't pretend otherwise.

Her movements are slow but firm, controlled, when she pushes the mug away and puts the spoon out of his hand before placing a hand square in the middle of his chest and pushing him back. Clint considers resisting, but he's curious, he wants to see how this ends, what she'll do, how far she'll take it. Leftover adrenaline still sloshes through his veins, slow to recede after his brain had already started to compile the highlights reel for his last moments. He could resist. He even thinks she'd back off, if he did. But he doesn't _want_ to stop her. 

She herds him backwards until his back hits the wall and doesn't waste any time with questions or pleasantries. Her hand rubs against the inseam of his jeans, working him through the fabric until he's hard and groaning, head resting against the wall and eyes half-closed. He doesn't quite dare to fully let her out of his sight; he's reckless, not stupid. 

Nothing in her expression, the way she's still watching him, would betray that she's got a hand on him, and yet it doesn't seem one-sided; it’s an exchange, he's letting go and she's taking it all in, drinking in every noise and every shudder, every small muscle twinge under her administrations. All the while, she still eyes him like he's prey, something to be devoured. 

A lioness, playing with her food. 

And while Clint's never quite seen himself as a predator, the role of helpless gazelle hits too close to home to be entirely comfortable. He pushes himself off the wall and puts a hand on each side of her hip, tries to take control and turn them around to reverse their positions. Either she misunderstands or plain disagrees, because instead of following his directions she walks them towards the bed in the middle of the room. Not with force, but with enough determination to make it clear that this will happen the way she wants or it won't be happening at all. 

His legs hit the edge of the bed before he's had time to make up his mind, a little preoccupied with the way his erection chafes against the confines of his pants with each step, keeping up just the right kind of pressure even though she's not touching him anymore. He's not a subscriber to the theory that a man with a boner loses all control over his higher brain functions; whatever happens tonight, it'll be all him. He's going to have to live with it in the morning, and there's always the option of walking away and rubbing one out in the shower. 

He lets himself fall back on the mattress, the Black Widow standing over him with just the faintest trace of heat in her gaze, and he decides that his pride will have to play second fiddle to curiosity, to arousal and a slight sense of danger that only makes him harder. She kicks at his calf with the tip of her shoes, and he scoots up the bed until he's laid out, head propped up one arm. She cocks her head, and he nods without any real idea for what, precisely, she sought his permission. 

She descends on the bed and straddles him, taking a moment to trace the inside of his upper arm with her fingertips and then pulling at his arm so he'll take it out from under his head and stretches it out behind himself. She does the same thing with his other arm, and then she bends to the side and opens a drawer on the bedside table, producing a thin, long leather belt. 

Clint's throat goes dry. He swallows past a lump in his throat and tenses, resists when she tries move his hands so she can tie his wrists to the headboard. 

Romanoff stills. She keeps looking at him, patiently, although she's started to breathe a little harder, the hint of a blush coloring her cheeks. But she'll wait. This is on him, and he's beginning to understand that he won't get a vote as to what she's doing, but he does get to call it quits. 

And he doesn't want to do that. 

He relaxes his arms so she can arrange his hands the way she likes before wrapping the belt around them and knotting the ends together so it functions as rigid, unforgiving restraints. Once she's done and the thought hits home that he's _bound_ , he feels his heartbeat spike with a whole host of conflicting emotions. Excitement and fear, some shame, all mixed up in a cocktail that should make him want to run, but instead has him riding a wave of arousal so intense he has to close his eyes against it for a second and breathe in and out a few times. He's never done anything like this. He never _wanted_ to do this. The idea never even occurred to him, and here he is, nearly jumping out of his skin when she touches the side of his face because he's completely forgotten to pay any attention to his surroundings whatsoever, he’s so lost inside his own head. 

Romanoff shushes him and seeks his gaze, and she's looking at him like he's something fascinating, something wondrous, when her fingertips trace around the shell of the ear that's without an aid, and then around the other. She makes quick work of easing that one out, too, and puts it on the dusty bedside table, and the expression on her face gets caught between glee and disbelief. She's panting right along with him and she seems _stunned_ , like she doesn't really know what she's doing either, as steamrolled as he is and too swallowed up by the sensation to hide it. 

Clint's not sure that's a comforting thought. 

They stare at each other for what feels like minutes, but might not be more than a few fleeting seconds, and then she tears a stripe of fabric from the ratty sheets and winds it around her hands, holding it up in front of her face. Apparently satisfied, she nods to herself, and slowly, giving him time to register protest, she lowers it down onto his eyes. With one hand, she lifts his head, and the other ties the makeshift blindfold together loosely. 

The loss of his sight drives home the fact that he also can't _hear_ much anymore either, that his world has been plunged into darkness and overwhelming silence. He's not fully deaf; he can hear just enough that it makes his mind go wild with maybes and possibilities, unable to make out any one sound and identify it but having him hyper-aware that there _are_ noises around him, made so much more confusing by the lack of visuals to help him figure out the sources. 

Fear coils tighter in the pit of his stomach, and he's only vaguely aware that she's touching him; she's touching him everywhere, her hands roaming his body like she wants to map it out and claim every inch of it, learn it and make it hers. The contact is somehow comforting and he manages to relax, just a bit, until it suddenly stops. There are more distant noises, the weight of her body on top of him shifting and disappearing, then returning in form of a presence against his thigh instead. 

He feels the tip of a blade slide down his collarbone and chest before biting into the skin on his stomach, and from one second to the next his fear runs cold and he's absolutely, completely certain he won't get out of this alive. He's deaf and blind and bound and has forfeited all and every way to defend himself, and now she's going to gut him on torn old sheets. Laughter wants to bubble up his throat; he can almost see it, like he's looking at his own future corpse from above, watching warm blood stain the fabric a bright red and drip onto the ugly worn carpet. 

Every survival instinct he has, every bit of his training, is screaming at him to stop her. His arms may be tied, but he doesn't strictly need them to at least put up a fight. His odds wouldn't be very bright, but he can use his legs, and his sheer bulk can serve as an advantage. He's got a chance. He tenses, muscles locking up, focusing his strength for one desperate strike – 

The trail of the knife stings, but not too much, as she leads it down his torso. Air hits his skin, making the fresh cuts prickle and burn, and it clicks, it's making sense now. She's not cutting him open. She's cutting his body armor away. His pants are next: she lifts the waistband a little and works the blade of the knife in between, nicking him along its path as the knife seesaws enough so she can part the fabric. Not all the way; as soon as there's enough wriggle room, she pulls them down his legs and pushes his knees up, leaving what's left of his pants in a tangle that serves as another restraint. 

The part of him that wants to put up a fight, that reminds him how he despises helplessness with every fiber of his being and has done so ever since he's been a kid, falls silent pretty quickly. More than that; it morphs into a turn-on. She doesn't have his best interests at heart. He's not entirely certain she won't change her mind midway through and decide it's in her best interest to kill him after all. She could use that knife to slit his throat and he won't even see it coming. Uncertainty pools in his belly, mixed together with something like excitement, but he swallows hard, shoving the voice of reason to the very back of his mind. 

There are buttons on his boxers, the decorative kind, a stupid non-functional gimmick. Clint can feel the tip of the knife circle around them now, pressure enough that he feels it through the fabric. That she's cutting them off is a guess; if they're falling somewhere where their impact produces a pling, he wouldn't hear it. The blade pressing in deeper, though, that he does feel, as she cuts the boxers off too. She traces the joint of hip and groin with the knife, leaving another trial of small cuts that burn slightly as the air brushes over them. 

He's naked, save for his pants around his ankles and his damn boots, and somewhere in the back of his mind it registers that this was the goal from the start, that they're fucking, for whatever measure of the word might apply in this case. But the realization still washes over him on a fresh wave of fear, a renewed sense of just how helpless and exposed his current position is; the position he let her maneuver him into. 

But he's still hard. Heaven help him, he's _still hard_. 

That fact is pushed to the forefront of his mind as she ghosts her fingers over his erection, precisely as if to remind him that he does, indeed, sport one. Her hand wanders deeper, fingertips teasing over his balls, all the way down his taint, then back up and over his inner things with more insistence, spreading his legs further apart. He wriggles his hips, pushes up into the touch, a silent plea for _more_ , but she ignores him. Keeps touching him in the most intimate places and in a way that seems like it's utterly for her, not for him. Claiming and exploring and making him hers. Even when she circles the head of his cock between two fingers and squeezes lightly, scrapes a fingernail across the slit to draw it apart, it seems somehow indulgent. He groans, not hearing the sound but feeling it reverberate in his chest. She leans in and fucking _blows_ across he tip, and it makes him shiver; he didn't quite notice how wet he was, precome gathering while he wasn't paying attention, too wrapped up in his thoughts. He doesn't see her, but he can imagine the vicious smile as she watches his reaction.

And then she withdraws completely. The mattress dips, and he senses her moving; not far away, but staying in one place, and the only comparison he can draw is an echo of the monotone motion, the simple up and down, that comes with jerking off. 

Whatever she's doing, he waits, because it's not like he can do anything else. He could speak, ask, but he wouldn't hear nor see the answer. He focuses on his own body: the weight of his cock, thick and heavy between his legs, teased and abandoned at her whim. The faint sting from the cuts that mark his body. The strain in his arms, not painful or uncomfortable, but familiar, like pulling a bow string taut. 

The smell hits his nostrils seconds before a finger brushes his lips, spreading moisture on them, and it has him open his mouth, eagerly; masturbation was a fair assumption for the source of the movements on the mattress, and he licks her taste off her fingers, thunderstruck by the realization that she's getting off on this just as hard as he is. Hard enough that she had to pause and take care of herself; hard enough that she's sharing it with him. He screws his eyes shut under the blindfold and groans, can't help craning his neck and chasing her finger when she withdraws, doesn't particularly care how needy a gesture that is. 

She moves again, and then her hands are working his boots off, pulling his pants all the way off, and she's pushing his legs up, then down, and bending them so that his feet are planted on the mattress. Gentle pressure forces his thighs down so his legs are spread wide, and he's going along with all of it, letting her move his limbs as she pleases to lay him out like she wants him. 

The sensation of her hand on his cock, clever fingers wrapped around him and already stroking, hits him out of nowhere. That's probably intentional, because she's not holding back. The rhythm she's setting is fast and unrelenting, her grip rough, too much too soon and yet downright incredible, perfect, and it seems selfish on her part, just another way to manipulate his body to her liking and bend it to her will. And that thought makes it better; anything else wouldn't have been fitting, would have broken the mood. He doesn't want to be taken care of, he wants to be _used_ , and that's exactly what she's doing. 

And as such, she doesn't allow him to find release this way. Just when he feels the pleasure build, balls tightening with approaching orgasm, she draws her hand away, leaving him to pump into thin air a few more times before his body caught up with the lack of pressure. He curses, embarrassed, of all things, by the worry that the words might sound odd because he can't hear them. He talks too loud when he can't hear himself, pronounces his things wrong sometimes. He doubts she'd mind, but for some reason that seems personal in a way that being naked and bound and perfectly at her mercy _isn't_. 

Clint doesn't have much time to linger on the thought, however, because just then she settles on his chest, the fabric of her pants rubbing against his skin across the full length of his torso, and he assumes she's straddling him. Before he managed a working theory as to _why_ , her palm closes over his mouth, his nose, closing off his air, and apparently he's still got enough brain cells to rub together to finally, finally struggle. He strains against his bonds. He trashes in an attempt to throw her off. He wildly shakes his head in order to try and dislodge the hand that's suffocating him. Panic clouds his thoughts as he tries and tries and tries to draw in a breath, futilely; all that achieves is creating a vacuum between his mouth and her fingers, and that makes it harder to get _any_ oxygen into his system, not easier. He wants to scream and can't do that either, for the same reason, and the fear trapped inside his suddenly aching chest makes him hyperventilate. 

That's when she shifts a little, reaching back, her other hand encircling his cock, tugging just so, and arousal crests in tandem with his panic, like they're pitching each other up, creating something darker and more intense than any emotion, any physical sensation, that he's ever felt. He's coming and it's almost painful, the way the muscles in his crotch tense and release, making him push his hips up with the force of his orgasm, buck against her weight, fuck up into the grip of her fingers. She lifts the hand from his mouth so he can breathe, suck the air back into his lungs in desperate gulps, again and again, and at the end of it he's trembling all over, his hands balled into fists in his restraints, toes curling, eyes wide open and blinking rapidly against the fabric of his blindfold. 

Romanoff scrambles off him, hands roaming over his collarbones, his neck, his jaw. Then the blindfold is gone and he gets to blink _at her_. Her face is flushed all the way down to her cleavage. From the looks of it she's breathing hard too. Good to have it reaffirmed everyone's been having fun, then. 

She signs a frantic _are you okay?_ at him, and he nods. She leans down for a kiss that somehow unsettles him more than anything else they did tonight; messy and intense and too much tongue, uncoordinated and full of emotion. Which emotions, he's not sure – he's still working through the part where he orgasmed from being _suffocated_ – but he's giving as good as he gets, and soon he's breathless once more. 

After they part, she goes for the knife again, now to cut off his bonds. The brief moment of fear that still comes from the sight of _the Black Widow_ hovering above him with a sharp weapon makes aftershocks swirl through his genitals, and he currently can't be arsed to examine that reaction too closely. He'll add it to the list and do that tomorrow. Or when he's back home. Or, well, maybe never. 

She hands him his remaining hearing aid and stands, stripping down to her underwear and turning off the lights, and the next surprise arrives when she lifts the covers and lies down on the other side of the bed, turned away from him. He's too spent to question that, so he slips under the covers himself, though not before perfunctorily cleaning himself with the sorry remains of his boxers. 

They've lain there in the dark for a few minutes when he feels her hand at his back, feels it run down his arm. Once she's found his hand, she laces their fingers together. 

Clint doesn't bother trying to make sense of that either. He closes his eyes, and he sleeps. 

 

***

 

Yet again, Clint wakes under the weight of her gaze. She's sitting at the foot of the bed, already dressed, staring at him and, given the places they went to last night, he's not even too offended by the invasion of privacy this time around. He stretches and yawns, and she inclines her head. 

“Why did you do that?” she asks, confusion clear in both her expression and her tone, and he suspects that's the question she's been staring into his sleeping form ever since... well, whenever she got up. “Why did you _let_ me do that?” 

“Because apparently I have the self-preservation instincts of a tick,” he says on the tail end of another yawn. It's probably impolite. He doesn't care. “Also I guess I got hit on the head a few times too often as a kid.” 

She frowns at him, obviously dissatisfied by his answer. Then she reaches into her pocket and produces a USB stick and holds it up. Wireless internet, he assumes, and of _course_ she had that all along. “Get dressed. We have a call to make.”

Clint pulls back the covers and swings his legs out of bed, and she hangs around, her gaze following his every move as he digs for his bag, slips into fresh boxers and collects his toiletries to head into the bathroom. 

When he comes back out, she's one the other end of the room, sitting on a rickety plastic chair at a similarly unstable small table, her legs elegantly crossed. 

He takes his time getting dressed. The base layer aggravates the cuts on his torso, the elastic of his boxers digs into the cuts on his crotch, and before he's even done he resigns himself to the knowledge that he's going to bear – to _feel_ – the marks of their encounter for a little while. He's used to returning home with a map of cuts and bruises, so that's not really a novelty; they shouldn’t feel different. 

They do, though. They send a shiver up his spine whenever he moves wrong and the cuts near his privates flare. He'll feel the scratch of fabric over the ones on his chest whenever he pulls back the string on his bow for at least a couple of days. He bites his lips at the thought, cock stirring, and shakes his head with vigor to shove that reaction down before it may show on his face, in his posture. 

Romanoff peers up at him with a neutral, almost blank expression. There's no trace of the woman who anxiously checked him over, after, to ensure she didn't break anything that wouldn't heal; the one who fell asleep anchored by his hand in hers. But that's okay. Clint wouldn't know what to do with her anyway. 

“You made a promise,” she reminds him, her face still void of emotion. No impatience or apprehension, no regret or reminiscence. “We had a deal, and I delivered my part.” 

Nodding, Clint pulls back another rickety chair opposite her and sits as well. He powers up his tablet and connects it to her mobile spot, then pulls up the app to call SHIELD. 

The same greenhorn as last time answers his call, and apparently he's learned. “Agent Barton,” he says, already rising, and mere minutes later Hill's face appears on the screen. 

She looks displeased. For real this time. Clint can tell the difference. “You really do make insubordination an art form. Any other agent – ”

“Any other agent isn't this good,” he interrupts. Across the table from him, Romanoff rolls her eyes just in time with Hill executing the same gesture in the chat window. They're going to get along _so_ well, given this works out. He should probably be worried. 

Romanoff stands and rounds the table, making virtually no sound, and Clint doesn't acknowledge her, keeps his attention on Hill. “So since you're calling in and therefore aren't dead,” the latter says, “I'm assuming we can mark the Black Wi-” 

That's when Romanoff leans into the frame, waving a little, and for a few seconds Clint has the rare pleasure of seeing Maria Hill speechless.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [tumblr](http://lostemotion.tumblr.com).


End file.
